US president promises to give Israel what it needs to ‘finish the job’ against Hamas, but decries ministers in Netanyahu coalition who want ‘retribution against all Palestinians’
TIMES OF ISRAEL
Full White House text of remarks by President Joe Biden at a Campaign Reception, December 12, 2023
President Biden: Thank you all so very much. Many of you have been my personal friends and political friends for a long time. I know I don’t look it, but I’ve been around a long while. (Laughter.)
And I want to thank you all — all of you — for — for your steadfast support. And, Rosy, particularly, thank you for that introduction and all the work you did to make this successful.
By Peter WoodDavid Randall, NAS
The National Association of Scholars (NAS) calls on the Harvard Corporation to remove Claudine Gay from Harvard College’s presidency.
President Gay is at the center of the controversy that followed her December 5 testimony to the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, in which she found herself unable to give a clear answer to questions about what Harvard could or would do in response to calls for genocide against Jews. Her answers on that occasion were far from satisfactory, but they are not the only reason why she should be removed from the presidency.
Read more…
Netanyahu acknowledges there is disagreement with the US about how Gaza will be run after the war: Gaza will be neither Hamastan nor Fatahstan.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday evening commented on the disputes between Israel and the US regarding the management of the Gaza Strip after the war.
“I greatly appreciate the American support for destroying Hamas and returning our hostages. Following an intensive dialogue with President Biden and his team, we received full backing for the ground incursion and blocking the international pressure to stop the war,” said Netanyahu.
INSS Insight No. 1798, December 12, 2023
By Eldad Shavit and Chuck Freilich
The US administration continues to support Israel’s goal of defeating Hamas, which is why it has thus far refrained from calling for a ceasefire and even went so far as to use its veto power to block a Security Council resolution. However, the administration has presented Israel with clear boundaries, especially when it comes to ensuring humanitarian aid to Gaza and the protection of civilian lives. It has also expressed some degree of frustration with what it sees as Israel’s insufficient response to US concerns and with the lack of a vision for “the day after” the war, following the administration’s presentation of what it believes should guide the postbellum discussion on the future of the Gaza Strip.
IDF says 500 terror suspects held in past month, some took part in Oct. 7 slaughter; Kerem Shalom crossing to open to ease aid flow as clips show apparent theft, looting of goods.
By Emanuel Fabian and TOI STAFF, 12 Dec 2023
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant speaks with soldiers near the Gaza border, October 19, 2023. /Chaim Goldberg
Hamas battalions in the Jabaliya and Shejaiya neighborhoods in the northern Gaza Strip were on the verge of collapse Monday, said Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, amid ongoing heavy fighting in and around the terror stronghold of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, and rocket fire on central Israel during the day.
“We have encircled the last strongholds of Hamas in Jabaliya and Shejaiya, the battalions that were considered invincible, that prepared for years to fight us, are on the verge of being dismantled,” Gallant said at a press conference Monday.
Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger
Contrary to the State Department’s eagerness to establish a Palestinian state, all pro-US Arab leaders have refrained from tangible steps toward the establishment of a Palestinian state.
It took J Street a week to turn on Israel. In less than two weeks it was lobbying against Israel.
By Daniel Greenfield, JNS 12 December 2023
U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken delivers a speech at the J Street National Conference in Washington, DC., Dec. 4, 2022. Credit: State Department Photo by Ron Przysuch
The Oct. 7 Hamas massacres hit hard at communities where many of the residents were left of center. As a result even some of the usual anti-Israel types temporarily came around to the idea of fighting Hamas.
That included the anti-Israel lobby group J Street.
EPOCH TIMES
[CLICK ON IMAGE]
“This person has risen to the leadership of a major university, but I don’t believe that the moral guidance is there or the intellectual integrity that you would expect. And I’m not calling for her to resign or to be fired, but I’m calling on the board of trustees of Harvard to look very seriously at these issues, and hold her to the same standard that they would hold a white male or a white female to.”
Read more…
Amir Tibon, HAARETZ
This denial is welcome for Israel’s Western allies, following both coded and explicit references to the transfer of Palestinians from Gaza by multiple Israeli ministers
A spokesman for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated on Sunday that Israel had no plans to move the Palestinian population out of the Gaza Strip, calling such claims “outrageous and false accusations.”
Eylon Levy made the comment in a talk with the foreign media, during which he was asked about remarks made by Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi earlier in the day. “What we are seeing in Gaza is not just simply the killing of innocent people and the destruction of their livelihoods [by Israel] but a systematic effort to empty Gaza of its people,” Safadi said at a conference in Doha.
Read more…
Anyone who has a naive belief in the power of higher education to instill morality has not studied the history of German universities in the Third Reich.
In 1927 the French philosopher Julien Benda published La trahison des clercs—“The Treason of the Intellectuals”—which condemned the descent of European intellectuals into extreme nationalism and racism. By that point, although Benito Mussolini had been in power in Italy for five years, Adolf Hitler was still six years away from power in Germany and 13 years away from victory over France. But already Benda could see the pernicious role that many European academics were playing in politics.
Those who were meant to pursue the life of the mind, he wrote, had ushered in “the age of the intellectual organization of political hatreds.” And those hatreds were already moving from the realm of the ideas into the realm of violence—with results that would be catastrophic for all of Europe.
The Palestinian Arabs support Hamas not because they have to, but because they want to.
Dr. Alex Sternberg Dec 11, 2023, 5:02 PM
(JNS) Beginning on Oct. 8, immediately after the Hamas massacre the day before, the Hamas choir worldwide cried out for a ceasefire, supposedly to protect the peace-loving citizens of Gaza.
Thankfully, the Biden administration stood fully behind Israel and loudly supported Israel’s right to defend herself. But it didn’t take President Joe Biden and his advisers long to realize that the Arab vote could be lost due to this support for Israel. Biden, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Vice President Kamala Harris immediately began to demand Israeli restraint. Unfortunately, the Democrats know they can always count on the Jewish vote, and thus take the Jews for granted.
Read more…
Shas chairman: The Palestinian Authority is unable to control Judea and Samaria – it does not have the capabilities to control Gaza.
Shas chairman MK Aryeh Deri said on Monday that there is no restriction on the IDF’s activity in Gaza and it will continue until Hamas is eradicated.
“Time is no timeframe. We will act as much as we need to, according to the needs of the army. Of course we do this while conversing daily with the Americans. When we achieve our goals we will stay in Gaza – to keep it demilitarized,” Deri stated in an interview on Reshet Bet radio.
PM tells Knesset committee the difference between Hamas and the PA is Hamas wants to destroy Israel now, the PA wants to do it in stages.
Netanyahu in committee meetingNoam Moskowitz-Knesset channel
“First of all we will win in the south and then we will deal with the north. As a first step, we will push Hezbollah beyond the Litani River and later we will also have to take care of the organization itself. If we open two fronts we can find ourselves not winning decisively in either of them,” Netanyahu stated.
“The days that Israel will rely on the labor of Palestinian workers are over,” said Minister of Economy and Industry Nir Barkat.
Israeli Economy Minister Nir Barkat meets with leaders in the business sector in Tel Aviv, Oct. 23, 2023. Photo by Avshalom Sassoni/Flash90.
(December 11, 2023 / JNS) Israel’s Socioeconomic Cabinet on Sunday evening voted to recommend not reintroducing tens and thousands of Palestinian workers from Judea and Samaria into the country’s pre-1967 lines.
The measure was reportedly opposed by almost all 15 members of the Socioeconomic Cabinet, which is smaller than the full government but includes the finance and economy ministers. Only Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter and Labor Minister Yoav Ben-Tzur abstained, according to Ynet.
By Irina Tsukerman, JCPA 11 December 2023
The logo of Iran’s First International Hourglass Festival
According to the Iranian media and officials, the Iranian Hourglass Festival, which celebrates Israel’s “imminent collapse,” follows a secret “plan” launched in 2015 with the announcement by the Islamic Republic’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to destroy Israel within 25 years. The strategy of uniting the Axis of Resistance fronts and proxies was devised by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Qods Force’s General Qassem Soleimani.
How Arab countries shaped our academic discourse.
Dr. Shmuel Katz, a leader in Israel advocacy in the United States, in a conversation with Arutz Sheva-Israel Nation News, discusses the rise in anti-Semitism on US campuses.
According to Dr. Katz, Arab countries have made for decades strategic investments in education, where financial contributions to the tune of billions of petro-dollars lead to increased influence and representation within universities in the form of appointment of scholars who align with the values of the donors.
This, he explains, has shaped the academic discourse and fostered a connection between the university and the interests of the donor countries.
MARK LEVIN
iT WAS DISPICABLE THEN AND IT IS DISPLICABLE NOW
The American media is covering this up
T. Belman. Kirk and Carlson get a pass. Owens does not.
By Rabbi Dov Fischer, JP Dec 3/23
The Hamas-ISIS Gaza War has erupted not only in the Mideast but also on Twitter, TikTok, podcasts, and YouTube. Social media language tends to be edgy. In the politically conservative Jewish community where I reside, three conservative commentators have elicited concern: Charlie Kirk, Tucker Carlson, and Candace Owens.
First, Charlie Kirk. His work on colleges is amazing. Is he anti-Semitic? I don’t buy it. Is he “a little bit anti-Semitic”? First, I don’t buy it. He is a Christian Zionist. Second, there is no such thing as a “little bit anti-Semitic.” That’s like “a little bit pregnant.” Remember that as you read on.
One Middle Eastern nation does indeed pay to influence U.S. foreign policy. Hint: It’s not Israel.
Martin Indyk and John Kerry, 2013.(Paul J. Richards/AFP/Getty Images)
SEPTEMBER 17, 2014
The New York Times recently published a long investigative report by Eric Lipton, Brooke Williams, and Nicholas Confessore on how foreign countries buy political influence through Washington think tanks. Judging from Twitter and other leading journalistic indicators, the paper’s original reporting appears to have gone almost entirely unread by human beings anywhere on the planet. In part, that’s because the Times’ editors decided to gift their big investigative scoop with the dry-as-dust title “Foreign Powers Buy Influence at Think Tanks,” which sounds like the headline for an article in a D.C. version of The Onion. There is also the fact that the first 10 paragraphs of the Times piece are devoted to that highly controversial global actor, Norway, and its attempts to purchase the favors of The Center for Global Development, which I confess I’d never heard of before, although I live in Washington and attend think-tank events once or twice a week.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken speaks during a meeting with human rights leaders at the State Department, Dec. 7, 2023 in Washington. (AP/Alex Brandon)
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken tells CNN that Israel, not the US, will be the one to decide the timing of the end of its war against Hamas.
“We have these discussions with Israel, including about the duration as well as how it’s prosecuting this campaign against Hamas. These are decisions for Israel to make,” Blinken tells CNN’s Jake Tapper.
